


When you die once, but an asshole brings you back to the land of misery. Relatable.

by prediabetic_stick



Category: Gintama
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Canon arcs still take place but they're changed a bit, F/M, Ginhiji endgame boys, Gintoki is an idiot, I don't even know how betaing works, M/M, My First Fanfic, Not Beta Read, One-Sided Attraction, Post Joui War, Rating subject to change, Slow Burn, Warning: Mitsuba is here, have mercy, plot holes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:34:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26870734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prediabetic_stick/pseuds/prediabetic_stick
Summary: Gintoki has died. His existence is dead, but his legs still insist on pulling him forward. What happens when his stubborn legs bring him to a certain dojo?Hijikata is just settling in, but one man refuses to make his life easy. What is moving forward, again?
Relationships: Hijikata Toshirou/Okita Mitsuba, Hijikata Toshirou/Sakata Gintoki
Comments: 11
Kudos: 45





	1. First Meetings are Pretty Important.

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is my first fanfiction. It's probably going to be rough because I'm not very good at writing, much less writing fanfiction, but if I don't do this, these ideas will haunt me.
> 
> Uh I rewrote this. So if you already read this and say, "Wait shit things are different" its my fault entirely >->
> 
> Little plot things (You can skip this if you just wanna read to figure this stuff out)  
> -Gintoki has just killed Yoshida Shouyo, and instead of ending up at Otose's, he ends up at the dojo Kondo ran.  
> -I'm using Kendo rules sometimes, but Kendo rules aren't really ever used in Gintama so the characters will specify when they're using the rules or not.  
> -Every big arc will happen here, just changed a bit.

A corpse roams the countryside’s paths. Above, the sky weeps upon the body that continues to roam. The wounds of the life those remains used to hold begin to open, welcoming the droplets of rain in.

Crimson red flowers spill out of cuts, flowing to the dirt. A red carpet forms, following the carcass, but no one except the grass, trees, and sky is looking. Yet, it continues to roam, seemingly soulless, but determined.

The legs attached are covered in dirt and grime, slowly being washed away by the persistent tears of the heavens and the red dripping liquid that keeps stealing from the legs it once was held by. They rise and fall in alternating order, tripping over the dirt to move forward.

Torn fabric simply lays. What the fabric used to be is indistinguishable anymore. The cloth only hints at its former color, now covered in the same mixture of blood and dirt as the legs. The body which the material is draped upon is slashed from all angles, cuts only centimeters away from vitals. The heart held within is beating, drumming with the rain.

The arms are lifeless, worse than every other body part. Less blood rests on them, but they are the most beaten. Their hands don’t hold anything except a green handbook, labeled with ink too wet to read. 

The head is covered in a dirty silver, dull red eyes peeking through the cracks. The deep red is full to the brim with sorrow, but they don’t let go of the tears waiting to spill. The remains of the face stretch, mouth opening, but before they can say anything, the body finally falls.

It's silent. The words couldn’t fall before the carcass could. The dull luster of silver left is mixing with the dirt below. Tears finally are allowed to flow from the matching pair of dull eyes. They mix with the dirt as well.

The hand holding the book let go for a moment. The book simply laid on the hand now. What life was left inside the cadaver is dripping out faster now. The heartbeat inside begins to falter. Lips open again, hoping to finally speak the words that weren’t given the chance before.

There’s a cough. A bright red splatters out. The mouth never closes.

“I’m sorry, Shouyo Sensei.” A hand tightens around the book.

“I’m sorry, Takasugi.”

“I’m sorry, Katsura.”

“I’m sorry, Ikeda-san… Asaemon.” The words try to force their way out, but a cough stops them.

“I’ll be leaving before you get the chance to execute me.” The corpse smiles once, before the eyes close.

-

Gintoki wakes up to pain surging through his body. Instinctively, his hand tries to reach out for a sword that isn’t there. The cold metal he’s searching for has been stuck in the dirt of wartime since the end of the Shiroyasha. Right. Now, he has no right to hold a sword; the reason he held one against so many has been killed by the same sword that served for that same reason. Shouyou. Shouyou. I’m sorry.

Suddenly, he hears footsteps coming toward him. To be truthful, Gintoki is a bit scared because with his injuries, he couldn’t do anything even if the stranger were to harm him. The shoji door guarding him slides open to welcome the new menace, and it walks in.

Straight, flowing greenish- black hair falling into V- shaped bangs and tied up into a ponytail, a furrow beneath those bangs that make a second V, and piercingly blue eyes that stood out among all those Vs. She’s carrying a bucket of water and some miscellaneous fabric. He’s met a lot of good looking people before, but this girl was just beautiful (despite the bitchy countenance and flat chest ruining her majesty.)

Gintoki just lets the words spill without any shame, just like before he was traumatized for life. Sometimes, this facade was easier than letting himself drown in the silence of sin. “Wow! Some hot babe is here to deliver me to the afterlife. Y’know, I always thought I would burn in eternal hell after I died, but this ain’t bad either.” He examines her and whistles, “Yeah… Ain’t bad at all.” Somehow, the furrow beneath her eyes gets even larger, and she all about drops the water she’s holding.

“You fucker! I’m a dude!” Gintoki has to let that sink in for a bit. “Is this how you pay respect to the people who saved your life?! Ugh! I knew Kondo was just picking up trash from the roadside from the moment I saw you!” ‘He’ (Gintoki still doesn’t completely believe that) proceeds to take off his bandages and picks up a rag to clean his wounds.

“Oh. You know you’re kinda rushing the process by taking off my clothes this early in the game, right?” He stops cleaning a wound on Gintoki’s leg to shoot a glare at him. “Geez! Don’t take it too seriously!” Gintoki smirks. “I like forward women after all.” He digs his nails into the wound, and Gintoki all but squeals at the pain.

“Be quiet.” Him and Gintoki surround themselves in silence until he’s done cleaning, stitching, and bandaging all the wounds Gintoki has. He gets up to leave, but stops before the door. “Hijikata.. It’s Hijikata.” As he walks out, he mumbles, “And I’m a man.”

Gintoki collapses where he was lying before. This time he takes the scenery in. He has a ragged futon below him, there’s cracks in the wall and floor, but despite all of this, it’s pleasant. The corners of the room are clean, the floor is shiny, the futon is soft, and the open shoji door allows for a cold wind to come in. It’s cold even with the futon and blanket surrounding him. Peeking out the corner are dead trees and a sturdy stick, just tall enough to let him use it as a cane. Hijikata, huh?

-

“Kondo-san , the stray cat you picked off the path woke up.”

Kondo spins around on his heel, dropping the banana he was eating, and meets Hijikata with sparkling eyes unfit for a man of his gorilla percentage. “Really?!”

“Yeah, really.” Hijikata is on razor’s edge right now after the encounter with the silver haired man, and it shows in his voice. “He’s an asshole, though. Can you put him back where you found him?”

Kondo isn’t paying attention, and instead heads towards the dojo. “Go say ‘Hi’ to him for me, Toshi! I forgot about getting back to practice!” Once, Kondo is gone, a head of tan hair pops out behind a tree.

“What’s up, Hijikata-nii” Big, wholesome looking red eyes stare into ‘done with everyone’s bullshit’ blue eyes.

“What kind of villainous plans were you planning behind that tree, Sougo?”

“Nothing. I was just thinking about getting to hug you, Toshi!” Hijikata is almost thrown off guard by this response, but still isn’t fooled by this facade. “Toshii!!” Sougo runs up to him and wraps his tiny arms around him. It almost feels good to be hugged by a nine year old until… Sougo punches him in his solar plexus and knocks him down.

“Hey! What was that fo-”

Sougo steps on his stomach where he punched him before and stares at Hijikata like this teenager almost exactly double his age is utter trash. “A girly excuse for a man shouldn’t have the right to my sister’s affections.” Sougo spits on him. “Cut your hair, bitch.” The tiny boy skips away far too cutely to be the same boy that committed these crimes against Hijikata.

Hijikata gets up, but feels something strange in his hair. He moves his hand to check what’s up with it and finds a glob of sticky tree sap mixed with whatever was on the ground. So that’s what he was doing behind that tree. Sneaky brat. Before Hijikata goes to get it out, he yells, “DAMN YOU SOUGO!”

-

Hijikata is sitting on the edge of a small pool of ice cold water surrounded by barren trees. It’s winter after all. He cups water to his hair and brings it to his black locks. It’s cold, but what isn’t? The rustling of branches echoes to his right, and he swings his head to see what or who it is.

Silver peaks through dead branches, and Hijikata feels like dying. He swings his head back to untangling his hair, feigning nonchalant. Please leave. Please leave. What are you even doing here? Before he can go on cursing the silver away from his hair related activities, there’s rustling beside him, and he realizes the man has planted himself next to him, cane sitting on a nearby tree. Fuck.

“Yo, Oogushi-kun.”

“Where the hell did you get that name from? Y’know, that name is a pun off of the Shinsengumi uniform that isn't even going to be a thing until five to seven years from now! And also my name is Hijikata! Hijikata! You fucking asshole!” While Hijikata is going on this tangent, he accidentally tugs way too hard on his hair and hisses in pain.

“Y’know, Oogushi-kun.” The silver haired man speaks in a dead tone, accompanied by the dead fish red eyes. Red eyes? There’s only one person I know other than this menace that has red eyes, and that’s... Oh, so all red eyed people are annoying fuckers. Glad, I know that now. The red eyed man stares at the lake and continues, “If you want someone to call you by your name, you should probably call them by theirs.”

It is at this moment, Hijikata realizes that he didn’t know the name of his new found enemy. He tries to play it off though, saying, “Pshh. Who would wanna learn the name of someone like you?”

“Someone like me, Oogushi-kun? I’m appalled! To think that you’ve just met me, and you think you know everything about me already. Youth these days. Geez!” Red turns to meet blue. “Wait how old are you?”

“18?”

“Sorry. Did I say youth? We’re the same age, yet you still act like such a child. My mistake. I’m sorry.” He looks too forlorn to actually be sorry. Those red eyes slip into pondering and his hand cups his chin, stroking a beard that doesn’t exist. “Oh right. You don’t even know my name!” He grins an all-knowing smile at Hijikata, “Is that why you were so mean?”

“No!... I mean- ”

“Shhhhh. I know you tsundere types like the back of my hand. It’s Gintoki.” Gintoki turns back around to the lake. He has this indecipherable look on this face, but Hijikata ignores it. Not completely though. It’s on his mind as he continues to untangle his hair.

It’s all too odd. From the way he couldn’t sense Gintoki coming sooner, to the amount of all types of wounds ranging from bullets to deep cuts to lashing from whips, to the bruises maring his skin, to the face he made just now for a reason Hijikata couldn’t figure out.

He’s so entranced in thought that he doesn’t notice Gintoki left before he couldn’t see him anymore. Another harsh tug to the hair. A clump of tree sap comes out. Score! 

-

Gintoki slips away silently, actively hiding himself as a habit from wartime. Takasugi and Hijikata are just two bunches of tsundere flaming garbage. Huh? He’s clutching onto his cane right now, knowing full well that he’s had worse during the war and could probably walk right now. At this point, the cane is just pacifying his need for his sword in his hand. The same sword marking his grave among the mountains of his comrades in the war.

He doesn’t know where he’s going. At this point, Gintoki is just exploring the same way he did when he first came to Shoka Sonjuku years ago. Walking forward, Gintoki hears the grunts of men synchronized to the sound of swords cutting air. A sound that makes him nostalgic of Katsura training the troops to prepare for battle, while Gintoki and Takasugi sparred about something nonsensical. What am I doing? Reminiscing like an old man while I’m only eighteen.

There's a gasp when Gintoki closes in on a wide and long building. 

“Hold it guys. One second.” Ah fuck. I let down my guard for a second, and they noticed me. “Hey man! Come over here!” Gintoki begrudgingly enters, and the man calling him signals for Gintoki to come stand beside him.

“Guys! This is- Uh. What’s your name?”

“Gintoki.” Gintoki is looking at the man speaking and is surprised to see this man is half gorilla and half human. Amanto probably did this to him, poor guy. Shit’s crazy.

“Guys! This is Gintoki! We’re gonna add him to our big family!” He didn’t even ask for Gintoki’s consent. Shit’s still crazy.

“Woah there, buckaroo.” The gorilla hybrid looks at him confused and hurt. “Family’s nice and all, but you gotta ask me first.”

“Oh.” The gorilla looks down solemnly, like an infant gorilla sad about not being able to eat bananas. He looks back up and turns toward Gintoki with a gleam in his eyes. “Gintoki-kun! Will you join our family?!”

It’s impossible to refuse with those gleaming eyes boring into his soul. Reluctantly, Gintoki says, “Fine. Fine. But” Red eyes become filled with something sinister. “Beat me in a duel first. I’m officially challenging your dojo, Gorilla.”

The people around are appalled by Gintoki’s lack of respect for the people who practically saved him from death. One tries to speak out, but is interrupted by the gorilla man.

Gorilla smiles. “Sure. I’ll accept your challenge.” He turns toward a tan haired girl Gintoki didn’t notice was there and signaled to give them shinai for the duel. She tosses them over, and both of the men catch their respective sticks. Men around them move toward the edges, hollowing the center of the room for the two to fight without being told to do so.

Gintoki and Gorilla spread to separate sides of the room.

The tan haired girl comes out again. She’s standing near the top of an invisible line splitting the room apart into where Gintoki stands and where Gorilla stands.

“3”

“2”

“1”

“Start!”


	2. Don't underestimate tiny children. Small kids are just balls of evil compressed into a cute-ish form.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the slow update. i don't really know how to write consistently. also this chapter has not been read over. its just word vomit. ill probably rewrite it later.

Hijikata is coming back from getting Sougo’s prank out of his hair when he hears the commotion in the main dojo room. To his surprise, from what he can see from the open dojo doorway, it seems that the silver haired asshole is facing off against Kondo… while injured? Why is no one pointing out the fact that Gintoki looks like he’s been blended and still participating in a duel?

“Start!” Mitsuba’s voice rings out from the room. Hijikata gets closer to get a better view, and some people make way for him. He sees Kondo and Gintoki staring at each other, ready to strike at a moment’s notice. Gintoki is missing his cane, which is extremely strange because he looks completely fine without it despite the wounds on his body.

Kondo takes the first step toward Gintoki. Gintoki doesn’t take a step back. Kondo grins, takes a couple swift steps forward, and swings his sword at Gintoki, but before he can get there… Gintoki falls flat on his face. He grumbles something muffled by the floor, and Hijikata thinks that he may have been more affected by his wounds than he led on.

Gintoki’s face lifts from the ground, resting his chin on the cold wooden flooring. He raises his arm, and exclaims, “Don't worry dude! I’m okay! I feel like I felt my entire body tearing when I moved though…” He’s loud, but the last part is a bit quieter.

Kondo is visibly confused by his battling mate falling down, but makes the realization that, indeed, Gintoki was extremely injured. The five stages of grief for trying to swing a kendo sword at someone who seemed so fragile in the moment flashed through his eyes visibly. Even Hijikata, densest of them all, could see it.

“Hey, dude. Can you pass me the stick? I kinda need it to walk.”

Kondo turns around to get it. “Oh yeah. Sorry, I didn’t notice you were injured.” Hijikata facepalms at this. What a stereotypically Kondo thing to do. Kondo’s facial expressions are always extreme. If he’s confused, which he is right now, it’s hysterical how he swings his head around. Kondo is searching for Gintoki’s stick, and finally finds it in-

“Wack!”

Everyone is shocked at the sound. Gintoki had hit Kondo in the back of the head with the shinai, knocking him down, and standing up to dust himself off. He reaches his hand down to Kondo and grins the most shit eating grin he’s ever seen.

“Good game, man! Well I’ll be on my way now-”

“Wack!” Tan hair settles after being jostled by a large jump. Gintoki is lying on the floor right next to Kondo.

“You cheated! You cheated against Kondo-nii!” Sougo pummels Gintoki with his tiny fists angrily, and the scene plays out like a tiny chihuahua biting a samoyed at a dog park. Gintoki gets up while being hit by Sougo, and tries to block the tiny tornado he’s caught in.

“Ow! Shit! Fuck! Stop!” Gintoki spits out obscenities while Sougo actively attacks where he’s wounded. “You fucking brat! Stop! I won! Fair and square! I’m injured, you know!” Sougo isn’t listening to his pleas of mercy.

“You cheated! You cheated against nii-san! Apologize! Kondo-nii is only a gorilla! He can’t help but fall for your stupid tricks!” Kondo grumbles from the ground in displeasure after being called a gorilla.

“I’m not a gorilla! I’m Gorilla Gorilla Gorilla!” Hijikata sighs and goes to break up the fight.

“Shut the fuck up! Sougo, you can punch him later, but don’t insult Kondo while you’re at it.” He goes to pull the nine year old, still throwing verbal abuse and physical abuse at Gintoki, away from Gintoki and Kondo. When Hijikata tries to wrap his arms around Sougo to get a better grip, the kid bites his arm until his arm leaks blood. Hijikata whips back, holding his arm around the bite.

“What the fuck?!” He looks down at the blood dripping. “Sougooooo!! You fucking shithead!” Hijikata goes to attack Sougo, who is attacking Gintoki, who was attacking Kondo, who is now on the ground crying about how our family shouldn’t hit each other.

-

Hijikata, Gintoki, Gorilla, and Brat escape from the fray with various amounts of bites, blood, wounds, bruises, and mental scarring. They’re all sat on the ground, silent and peaceful. The dojo students watched the entire thing without stopping them, and throughout the process, their faces turned from amused, to slightly horrified, to oh god please stop, you’re going to kill someone like this, even if Sougo is a brat, he’s literally nine, oh god, oh god-

“Can I leave now? I won the fight, so…” Gintoki picks his nose, and the action causes more blood to spill out.

“You cheated! You didn’t win against Kondo-nii!”

‘Kondo’ as Sougo and Hijikata call the hybrid gorilla is crying. Hijikata sees this, gets up first, and walks over to Gintoki, punching him in the head.

“Hey what the fu-”

“You technically lost since you fell first. Accept it, asshole, and become our work slave in repentance for cheating against Kondo.” Hijikata glared down at him, and Gintoki was contemplating beating him up for his sins against him.

“His fault for falling for it. We never established any rules.” Gintoki sweeps the other’s legs, knocking him down to the ground with the rest of them.

“By that logic, there would be no grounds for winning then!”

“Whatever. We can just call it a draw. I won’t join your family, but I’ll stick around as a plus one addition.”

“When did we ever say we wanted you to join us? Also, you being a plus one would be the equivalent of a mosquito permanently landing on your shoulder to suck your blood.”

“The gorilla said so, and I’m not a vampire.” Gintoki goes back to picking his nose. He’s not quite ready to join another family after having Shoka Sonjuku entirely crushed by Amanto and with his own hands. Hijikata shoots Kondo a glare, presumably because Kondo didn’t ask anyone else about letting Gintoki in.

“Gintokiiiiiii-san, pleassseeeeee…” Kondo pulls at the hem of the yukata they gave Gintoki, crying. Puppy eyes shine while he begs, “I just want another frieeeeendd.”

“Kondo-nii. The only one who wants him to be part of this dojo is you.” The kid gives Gintoki a dirty look. “You’re lucky Kondo wants you here because I want you dead, and I always get what I want some way.” The tan hair child reminds him of when Takasugi came to Shoka Sonjuku for the first time, haughty and spoiled.

“Ah, calm down.” There’s a feminine, soft voice coming from behind Gintoki, and he turns around to the source. Oh she’s the one who led the match. She has tan, long hair, same as Sougo. Just from the side of her face, Gintoki can tell she’s ethereal. Hijikata-kun.”

“What?” Hijikata is blushing from the moment she said his name. It’s young love at it’s finest. Gintoki is a bit jealous that the men over at the dojo had the luxury of such pure love. There was no such thing on the battlefield, only hook-ups and, for the men who did fall in love, broken hearts for those who died or broke under the pressure. 

“Thank you for taking care of him. You did such a great job of tending his wounds with me.” She smiles, and turns to Gintoki. “I’m sorry. I didn’t get your name. I’m Mitsuba by the way.” Gintoki didn’t really get why Hijikata was blushing, but now it is clear as day. Holy shit. She is an actual angel. I’m going to lose my shit. How does talking work again? Am I hard? I hope I’m not hard. I’m going to embarrass myself in front of the only female encounter I’ve had since Sakamoto dragged me to the red light district. AHHHHHHHH-

“My.. M-My name is G-G-Gintoki Sakata..” Gintoki’s face is flushed red. “N-Nice to meet you. Th-thank you for t-t-taking care of me.” She smiles even kinder somehow, and Gintoki’s internal system crashes. He wants to cry after beholding Mitsuba’s kindness worthy of a goddess.

“No problem. It’s only natural that we take care of those who are inj-”

“Onee-san! He’s such a dirty cheater and a jerk! You shouldn’t be so nice to him!” A foot comes crashing down on Gintoki’s face. “He tricked Kondo-san to win because he’s a pussy!” Gintoki is now laying flat on the ground with a small child with one foot on his face and one foot on his chest. He can feel blood from what was supposed to be a closed wound spilling.

“Sougo! He’s bleeding!” Mitsuba hits him on the head, which causes him to press even harder on Gintoki. At this point, Gintoki might die from blood loss by the look of how much blood keeps spilling. “You can do it later, but not now. Let him at least enjoy a drawn out death, Sougo.” Gintoki is fucked. The angel he believed in to free him from this devil spawn was actually Satan herself.

Mitsuba carries him off, but Sougo gives him a last kick in the arm before relenting to his sister’s grasp. Gintoki gets up, clutching his chest, trying not to die from the wrath of a nine year old.

“Can I-” Gintoki coughs up blood. “Can I please get some help for my chest wound real fas-” He passes out.

-

As much of a jerk the silver haired man was, he didn’t deserve to be almost killed by Sougo. That’s why if Hijikata got a penny for everytime he took Gintoki’s clothes off, it would be two. Which is not that much, but it’s weird that one 18 year old teen boy has taken off another presumably 18 year old teen boy's clothing twice in a couple days. Which is strange without context, but Hijikata swears it’s only because Gintoki keeps fucking dying all the time.

All of the wounds that were sewn up have at least partly opened thanks to Sougo (and partly Hijikata) punching the life out of Gintoki. He’s cleaning and sewing them back up, when Mitsuba enters the room. He can always tell when she does for some reason. Her steps are much softer than anyone else’s and her very presence is comforting.

“Hijikata-kun?”

“Hm?

“Do you think Gintoki-kun cheating was so bad?”

“Of course why wouldn’t it be!?” Hijikata huffs. “Cheating is always immoral.”

“Hm. If you think it’s so horrible, you should challenge him to again when he’s better.” Mitsuba smiles and looks away. “Maybe he’s not as bad as you think.” Hijikata is confused, but everything about the man he’s treating is confusing. Maybe Mitsuba’s womanly intuition was telling her something Hijikata didn’t care to realize.

“Thank you for the idea. I guess that’s fair enough. He was injured after all.” Mitsuba starts to walk out, but he’s not done talking yet. “Oh and… Can you ask Kondo to stop bugging me about Gintoki refusing to join us?” She turns around to smile and continues to walk out. As pretty Mitsuba was, he never really knew what she was thinking.

-

Gintoki wakes up to an empty room and pain. Didn’t this just happen to me a little while ago? His chest hurts like hell, and where Sougo kicked hurts like hell. Everything hurts like hell. His ears are ringing, his mouth is dry, it’s fucking cold, but mostly he’s hungry.

Gintoki gets up, stretching his arms despite how the pain when he moves is worse than when the first time he woke up in this hell hole. He opens the shoji doors and sees one snowflake from the sky fall. It was already snowing at the prison. Weather changes so much depending on where shit is. Huh.

He walks out the room. The dirty yukata he’s wearing is doing nothing to stop the cold, but that’s fine. There’s been worse days out in the cold than this. The worst days were not that long ago afterall.

There’s nothing to do, so Gintoki simply wanders around like he did before Kondo interrupted him. He takes a couple steps out into the cold, and he notices a small boy peeping from the side of a building. Ah. This is the boy who kept punching me. Souichirou. Yeah, I think that's his name

The boy still hasn’t noticed that Gintoki has seen him, so Gintoki walks toward the boy, calling, “What’s up Souichirou-kun?” Red eyes reflect red eyes.

“You cheated!” The boy curls his hands into a fist. “I want you to go into dogeza and apologize to Kondo-nii!” There's a flaming passion in the smaller boy's eyes. Gintoki is not very threatened by this tiny chihuahua getting ready to fight, but he amuses him anyway.

“So what?”

“I want you to fight me! Fair and square!” Everything about this tiny child screams determination. It’s a face that gives Gintoki such nostalgia for the past that he pauses for a bit. Souichirou is still keeping his game-face on, but Gintoki just laughs and ruffles his tan hair.

“Sure. We can do it fair and square.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please tell me if this is unreadable and i will rewrite it faster. i cant wait to be bullied. also on my google doc this said it was exactly 2200 characters, so that was pretty cool.

**Author's Note:**

> Please tell me if this is shit. I wanna get better, so if you have time please tell me what is shit too. I rewrote this because I thought it was shit, but it might be worse than before. So tell me if you hate this and I'll revert it ._.


End file.
